What if you pick the "dead" server?

Suppose a few x-pacs down the road one of the servers starts hurting for progression and becomes a ghost town? Is there going to be any way off it?

IMO, since DBG intends to make an identical server ruleset, keep them both on the same progression lines so that down the road they can be merged when the average population drops below a given point.

Prevent name issues by having the two servers share a combined name-set.

No one wants to lose a year+ of time played on a character that hits a dead end.

Re-roll on the other server as soon as you know it's dying.

No there will be no way off of it, at least not for a while after enough begging for a merge happens. Look at the last two progression servers. The one that opened second quickly started losing population it will happen this time around too.

That's why i'll be playing on both.

lockjaw will be the dead server, there is no doubt about it. Vulak was the 'dead' server but it at least launched a few hours into the release. lockjaw will be over a week late and i imagine most players would rather continue playing hoping everyone flocks to lockjaw.

Lockjaw would do well if it opened up the trilogy at launch. I would switch and I know most of my guild would too, but for whatever reason they don't want that. which is weird, because the sooner the tlp servers get into pop+ the less gm involvement required. lockjaw.

Sleeper was pretty much inarguably the stronger server for TLP 1.0 - it's where RoI came from for crying out loud.

Secondly, late into Vulak they adjusted the code on transfer tokens to allow them to be used to transfer TO TLP servers and offered them for free for a timeframe. They obviously came later than intended because they needed to realize the problem and in amongst other things worked on the coding to allow only Vulak tokens to transfer to Fippy while not allowing other servers to that delayed when they could be allowed.

This code however is already done (besides adjusting it to Rage/Lockjaw as a pair) now so would only take them responding to "Hey, server is dead" posts which they've been QUITE responsive this time around.

In short - you're all chicken littles doing what chicken littles do - yes, there's a bad precedent with ONE case (since Sleeper did awesome and was still a pretty comfortable population at the merge - at least 3-4 raiding guilds and enough casuals to recruit from consistently before the merge - more alive than many HEALTHY current era EQ servers) - but there's a ton of backend work that would prevent it from being a problem, and the improved responsiveness of the development team would likely improve it as well.

Am I the only one who thinks they're actually making the RIGHT choice?

They've said that Ragefire is currently holding 3x as many players Fippy. Assuming only 25% change servers, that's still 1 very healthy server population and another that's average size. Who's to say both servers can't succeed?

Due to the amount of interest this time around, and the fact that we have pickzone instances (which imo is why people are sticking around), there's a chance neither server will "die". The servers are now running on 6 months progression cycles, which should make the masses stick around longer as the population fall off after specific expansions every time. And I can tell you they aren't pre-POP expansions. So these progression servers should last longer by default.

Lockjaw will likely be the lower of the two, but lower doesn't mean it'll be dead. There are over 4,000 people actively playing on Ragefire, so even if only 1/3 move over, that's still well over 1200 players. That's more than enough to crowd up the servers. There are simply a lot more players interested in this round of progression servers as before. I believe having pickzone instances is a big part of why people are sticking around longer.

And that isn't even counting the people TRYING to log in.

As of tonight, queues are still over an hour.

Mardy - We don't know the exact numbers, servers are capped at "well more than 4000" (according to Holly's Twitter) - I'd expect at least 4500 minimum from that statement, likely 5-6k.

Additionally since that's referencing the cap and we're hitting 2+ hr queues even above that, there's likely at least hundreds beyond that.

So yea, splitting a likely 5-6k (maybe even 7k) people into two servers on 3-4k and another 1.5-3k doesn't exactly sound horrible. Oh no, only 1499 other people playing on my server, it's so quiet with so few people in Classic. [Hint: Most of the liveliest Live servers hit near to 1k with ALL that content to spread them out - and yet, it still doesn't feel dead on those unless you go to ancient zones... funny that...]

The dead server? Do we really think the population is going to last, 6 months, in classic on one server? much less on two? almost all the raid bosses are downed, sure people can farm the planar gear and boss lewts, but some of that planar gear sucks for the class and will be replaced as soon as kunark opens. This will just be a good opportunity to get everything for your epic ahead of time, at least.

Fixing the mages would have been a good idea, then perhaps wouldnt be as many boxes. I know myself have felt inclined to box more mages becaues of how ridiculous they are. Why bother having a tank?

IF fippy/vulak are any indicator both servers will have populations capable of doing things throughout SoD.... Vulak and Fippy were neck and neck until SoD iirc.

Yup, I was totally lowballing it There's a good chance both servers will hit over 2-3k players during primetime. I don't think people have to worry about picking the dead server this time around. I won't be moving myself due to having established my set characters, names, and such. But for those upset about not able to login during the first 2-3 days, be it launch issues or long queues, this is a great chance for a fresh start.

I think the 2nd server will make a lot of people happy.

As much as I realize, after 16 years with them, that the people behind this game seem to have this uncanny and consistent knack for not learning from their past mistakes, the optimist in me would like to think that they have and will.

Pop cap was raised to, what 5k players? With enough more waiting in the queue for hours to get in? That's more than enough players to support two servers. For how long is another issue, but we shall see, I guess. What they do when low pops do become an issue is a concern, but as a player it's a concern for another day, for me at least. I've been dying for a fresh start on a fresh server for a few years and this is just what the doctor ordered.

I was not one asking for a new server nor did I think there would be one, but I, personally, am really excited that they are doing this. I was wholly unprepared for Ragefire launch and had RL stuff going on all weekend, queue notwithstanding and I'm pretty stoked for a second opportunity to jump in the way I like to.

I welcome a less crazy server. This one is so full of griefers. Any intro city, more often than not a high level aggressive is trained to the entrance, guards just stand there, bodies of slain level ones all over the place. Training is very common, as is kill-stealing. I would love a progression server where this was not rampant. Sometimes quieter is better.

Why you in such a rush?

Friends will be split, its just not a healthy environment on the new server. In the back of everyones mind is "Will this one be deaD? am I wasting my time?" and then they';ll quit or go back to rage fire.

Its pretty obvious the dead server is going to be Lockjaw. Look how Fippy and Vulak turned out. Fippy was up only like what, 1 hour? Before they took it down and brought it back up with Vulak. And Vulak was already noticeably smaller in population.

We're going to have more than 1 week of Ragefire up. Over 1 week. It's going to be a wasteland on Lockjaw lol.

The only way there's a dead server is if they make the server the same ruleset. Then people will bounce back and forth with whichever server is better.

Looking back to how all the other "second" servers in the TLP lineup ended, ill stick with the overcrowded ragefire, at least seeing people everywhere reminds me of launchday in 1999, even if some of those people are boxes, how someone else plays their game doesn't affect me.

But really the new instances comming in should fix the issue, last night i personally had no queue as opposed to a 1 hour long one, what where people expecting on a launch weekend anyway?